


Short 42 - Wallowing in the Mud

by stgjr



Series: "The Power of a Name" Series 3 - "Time Lord Penitent" [30]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005), Multi-Fandom, Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann
Genre: Crossover, Gen, Multiple Crossovers, Multiverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-12
Updated: 2017-07-12
Packaged: 2018-12-01 06:53:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11481015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stgjr/pseuds/stgjr
Summary: Our narrator takes Katara to a world seeking to inspire hope in her, but instead is met by all of the flaws in Human nature he detests.





	Short 42 - Wallowing in the Mud

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally posted on July 11th, 2015.

I had a new situation in the TARDIS now. Not having multiple Companions, since I'd had two of them quite a few times, but they were always together in some fashion. But now I had two Companions completely different, and Katara - the survivor of a timeline that never was, who had seen Aang and Sokka and all her other friends and allies and family slaughtered by the Dai Li of Korra's time and her own - was full of frustration and anger and all sorts of other negative feelings.  
  
So Liara and I decided to improve that by showing her uplifting, hopeful things. Our first visit, to the growing city around the _Axiom_ and to a little robot named WALL-E who made it all possible, had gone well enough. She'd even smiled once from the playing of children and helped bring up an underwater aquifer for irrigation.  
  
Our second visit... didn't turn out so well.  
  
We arrived at Kamina City to find part of it in ruins, and the streets filled with enraged citizens. Instead of the triumphant statue of Kamina, a Human who I found to be simultaneously annoying and enjoyable, we found only its wreckage. And the word on the street was the same; Kamina's adopted brother, his successor Simon, was to be put on trial for his life for unspecified "war crimes", with the city's populace having been in a riot demanding his head over damages.  
  
So much for a shining example of hope and human spirit.  
  
Well, I suppose they were under pressure. The moon was falling on them. Or rather whatever had replaced it.  
  
I already had bad feelings about the entire affair, but at the behest of Kittan and others who had rallied to the banner of Kamina and Simon, I decided to attend the trial. I was given a front row seat with my Companions. I sat and quietly waited for things to get settled and for Simon's subordinate Rossiu to be ready to commence proceedings. He had grown as well. But I didn't sense the same kind of maturity in him. There was something offputting about it.  
  
When they were gathered I stood. "Chief Advisor, I would be willing to stand as Simon's advocate," I said in a loud and clear voice. Grunts of approval came from all of Simon's allies. But I saw only stares and cold silence from others.  
  
"While we are grateful to you for the services rendered in the past, I'm afraid you have no qualifications that are recognized to stand in his defense," Rossiu replied smoothly. "I wouldn't want people to say I had the Supreme Commander defended by an untrained advocate. Balinbow will defend Simon."  
  
I blinked as a susseration came from the others. Balinbow was one of two twin brothers who had both the constitution and mental capacity of a rock. Rossiu couldn't honestly think that I was less qualified to...  
  
Oh.  
  
At that point, I saw what was happening. And I felt the first surge of disgust. This wasn't a fair trial. It was a kangaroo court to appease the mobs by giving them a scapegoat, and obviously to hand power over to Rossiu and his technocrats.  
  
I took my seat again and remained quiet. "It's a setup," I heard Liara sigh, but I didn't respond. I simply listened.  
  
I listened at the foolishness. The stupidity. The self-righteous pomposity. I listened as a young man who had done everything he could for others, who had fought to bring Humanity up from the dark tunnels below the surface and throw down the tyrant who had kept them there, was torn down to appease a bloodthirsty mob. I listened to them misconstrue every action, twist every word, and do everything to ruin the man who'd made this world possible for them, and all in the name of fleeting survival.  
  
Why?  
  
Why do you Humans have to be this way? You can be so much _more_. You have such compassion, such empathy, such a strong moral sense that you can put even older species and timeless beings to shame when you try. Why do you have to descend into the muck like you so often do? You give up all of the blessings of your gifts and jump into the mud from fear and panic or smallmindedness or just plain foolishness. You turn on your own kind, you betray every moral principle you've held, you.... I can hardly find more words to describe the depths to which you lot will sink. I can only sum up my disgust and disappointment with Humans with one question.  
  
_Why do you have to act like such big, dumb, foolish **APES**? Why?!_  
  
By the time Kittan, the head of the government's legal office and another veteran of Team Dai-Gurren, began protesting I'd had enough. I felt sick to my stomach. I stood without being prompted and began to walk around the rows and up the stairs toward the exit from the viewing gallery.  
  
"Wait, Doctor, where are you going?", Rossiu asked. "Doctor, we haven't adjourned."  
  
I ignored him.  
  
"Doctor, we are in need of your assistance." Rossiu's lieutenant Guinble, who had prosecuted, looked down from behind those bland spectacles of his. "The problem with the moon..."  
  
He continued, but I ignored him. My sensations warred within me; whether to vomit from how sick the entire charade had made me, or to spew forth vitriol for how disgusted I was.  
  
Liara and Katara came up behind me. Liara took my arm. "Doctor, maybe we should..."  
  
I yanked away wordlessly. I didn't dare speak. I would have filled the courtroom with my denunciation. And I might have truly lost my temper and gone even further. Nevertheless, because Liara prompted me to turn, I did look back at the main table, where Rossiu had sat in judgement of what was supposed to be his best friend. I knew my eyes were seething from my sheer disgust. And I didn't care. Let them see it. Let them see how disappointed I was in them.  
  
"Stupid apes. Stupid _stupid_ apes."  
  
I found, to my surprise, that I was verbalizing that thought. It had slipped out unbidden and I didn't care. I let them see the look smoldering in my eyes for another moment before resuming my departure.  
  
As we exited and came up to the TARDIS, Katara looked at me. Her eyes were full of fury. I wasn't surprised. In seeing them railroad Simon, she undoubtedly relived every time Aang was shown the same kind of astonishing ingratitude. And the only way I could respond to that was by showing more of my own disappointment in them.  
  
We returned to the TARDIS and I, without a bit of ceremony, hit the TARDIS lever to dematerialize. We shifted away.  
  
Looking back, maybe I was being unfair. Maybe it was unkindness to expect people to react better to being told they were about to be exterminated, to having their homes and businesses wrecked by a new opponent who demonstrated such power and capability. Maybe they were acting naturally.  
  
But that didn't make it right. It didn't change the fact that yet again Humans had dived back into the mud and given up everything that made them such a great species to witness.  
  
And to such behavior, there was only thing I could show toward it.  
  
My disgust.


End file.
